


Rrraul the V8th, Champion of the Lucky 38

by Trystero



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout: New Vegas, Mad Max Series (Movies), Mad Max: Fury Road, Top Gear (UK) RPF
Genre: Blues Brothers, Drive-by shootings, Gen, Grenade-launchers, Interceptor, Mash-up, Mayhem, Miniguns, Motorbikes, Pirates, Ram-raiding, Revenge attacks, Sea Monsters, Vehicles, War Rig, Warboys
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-23
Updated: 2016-04-23
Packaged: 2018-03-31 22:15:53
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,745
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3994951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trystero/pseuds/Trystero
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A method of producing fuel is discovered in New Vegas, and the Lucky 38 gang decide to engage in a little vehicular Legion-trolling. But the Legion are no shrinking violets when it comes to non-conventional warfare, and revenge is Vulpes R. Inculta's middle name...</p><p>A volatile cocktail of Fallout, Mad Max 1 & 4, and Top Gear with a touch of The Blues Brothers and a dash of Looney Tunes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

The Lucky 38 Gang was sitting around drinking Cass’ moonshine one evening when Raul started staring at his drink so hard that the Courier thought he was trying to get it to spontaneously combust. Which, being Cass’ moonshine, it might.

“Y’ok there, dude?” she asked. Lost in whatever thought he was having, Raul didn’t answer for a long moment.  
Then he went, “Hmm,” and got up and put his jacket on. “I gotta go to my place for a little while,” he said, walking out the door. The gang heard the ding of the lift, and all looked at each other.

“That might be the last we see of old stinkypants,” Cass observed.  
Arcade returned, “Given that you have the second stinkiest pants in this organisation, Cass, and that’s saying something,” he flicked a glance at Boone, “I don’t think you’re anyone to cast aspersions.”  
“Wrong. Dead wrong. Rex stinks a million times worse than me,” said Cass, simultaneously pointing fingers at Arcade and Rex and incidentally semaphoring the letter “S”. Rex, flaked out on the rug after a hard day of chasing giant ants, thumped what remained of his tail.  
Veronica tapped her glass with a fingernail. “Not sure I have the requisite intellectual chops to get involved in this erudite conversation, but someone has to point out that Rex doesn’t wear pants.”

And so it went on, late into the night - Cass’ moonshine tended to have that effect; and Raul never did come back.

Until five weeks later, that is. And when he came back, it was with a roar.

“Boss. Veronita. Miss Lily. You,” Raul formally greeted the ladies as he stepped into the kitchen where they were breakfasting. ‘You’ was of course Cass. They had a mutual disrespect bordering on affection.

He ushered the gang, including Boone and Arcade, outside.

There, the Courier was dumbfounded at what she saw. She stared at Raul’s gift, in a way reminiscent of the way Raul had stared at Cass’ moonshine that fateful evening.

A bright red 4-wheel drive stood parked at a jaunty angle on the front steps of the casino.

“Is... that...” she whispered.  
“A Toyota Hi-Lux. Si,” Raul said, stroking the front fender proudly.  
“But... but...”  
Arcade formed the question for her. “What does it run on?” As soon as he’d said it he knew the answer, and Raul’s wide grin confirmed it.  
Cass’ moonshine.

“Step over here, señoras,” Raul said. Behind the Hi-Lux two more vehicles were parked. A curious crowd had gathered, and Raul shooed them away, using Rex to threaten some NCR grunts who tried to touch the cars.

The second car had an angular body of unpainted metal, and strange doors.  
“Oh my,” Arcade boggled. “Is that an original DeLorean?”  
“It is,” Raul beamed.  
“Where on earth did you get these?”  
“That old car museum near Utobitha. Uh, Black Mountain I mean.”  
“But that place is infested with centaurs!”  
“Not anymore,” Raul grinned, spinning his .44s.  
“How come it hasn’t rusted?” enquired the Courier, walking round it and leaning down to peer through the narrow windows.  
“It’s made of aluminium,” Arcade explained. This car was famous in pre-war books. Famous for its retro-futuristic looks, and for its poor engineering. He hoped Raul had twinked it a little.  
“You open the doors like this,” Raul grasped the handle and pulled up. The gullwing doors opened upwards and the crowd gasped.

The Hi-Lux was very cool, and the DeLorean was even cooler, but the third car had the biggest fanclub of awestruck onlookers. It was a pitch black XB Falcon GT351 with tinted windows and what looked like part of its engine sticking out of the bonnet.  
“What’s that?” the Courier asked, pointing at it.  
“Supercharger, boss,” Raul replied.

Boone opened the passenger door of the black car and got in. He adjusted the seat as far back as it would go, and settled down, eyes hidden behind his ubiquitous shades.

“Well, kick it in the guts,” the Courier suggested. Raul leant into the car and turned the engine on. A sound like a vertibird taking off filled the air, deafening everyone. Boone, in the car, didn’t move a muscle.  
“It’s the last of the V8s!” Raul bawled over the engine’s whine. “It’s the duck’s guts! Sucks nitro! 600 horsepower!!!”

The courier nodded, appreciating the sheer epicness of the sound it created. She leaned in and switched the engine off. The sudden silence hushed the crowd  
“Raul,” she said solemnly.  
“Yes, boss?” the ghoul looked suddenly nervous.  
“You have been promoted,” she said slowly, gazing at the cars. “You are now, Raul the V8th, Hero of the Lucky 38.”

Raul grinned so widely his jaw nearly dislocated.

***

The first thing to decide was who would drive what. There were eight of them, and three cars, but it divided easily because Lily was too big to fit in any of the vehicles so she climbed up into the back of the HiLux pick-up, and Rex jumped up to keep her company. So that left two people per car.

“Raul the V8th, Hero of the Lucky 38, you have first choice because you created these works of mechanical art,” the Courier decreed.  
“Aw, no boss, you choose,” Raul might have blushed if he still had any skin on his cheeks.  
“You choose first, I’ll go second,” the Courier insisted, hoping like hell that she got to drive the black Falcon.  
Cass butted in, her voice teasing. “You! No you! You guys are fuckin’ ridiculous. Gimme the goddamn silver car. Who’s with me? V’ronica. Get in the car.”  
“Yes ma’am!” The mech-loving scribe didn’t need to be told twice.

They ended up with Raul driving the HiLux, Arcade riding with him because - he said - it looked like the safest of the three vehicles (or the least unsafe), and the Courier getting the Falcon with Boone riding shotgun. Which is where he already was, making use of the built-in cigarette lighter, and looking like he’d moved in for good. So it worked out nicely.

It was a hot day and even hotter inside the Falcon. It was mercifully dark inside, though. The tinted windows kept most of the sun out.

The interior of the car was as beautiful and menacing as the exterior. The Courier stroked it sensuously, admiring the wondrous craftsmanship of the pre-war world.

She remembered something. “I saw a holodisk with a car like this in it, once, a long time back. The car was called The Interceptor.”  
Boone put his pack of cigarettes on the dashboard and turned to look impenetrably at the Courier. He nodded, once, slowly.  
The Courier nodded back. “Interceptor. Yeah. Let’s go intercept stuff.”

She pressed the ignition and that vertibird turbine sound surrounded them again, though dulled inside the car.

It was hard getting out of New Vegas because the drunken idiots all over the Strip wouldn’t get out of the way fast enough. None of them had ever seen a working car before and they stopped and stared, right in front of the vehicles.

A crackly voice from the dash said “Boss? You hearing me?” It was Raul, calling from the Hilux on an intercom.  
Cass’ voice came through from the DeLorean, “I hear ya!”

Freeside was as bad as the Strip. The Courier was having trouble avoiding running people over. Distractedly, she told Boone to communicate with Raul on her behalf.

Communication was not Boone’s forte.  
“Go,” was all he said into the handpiece.  
“Boss, where we going?”  
The Courier muttered, “In this heat, I wanna go to the North Pole.”

The sniper might have thought she was joking, but she wasn’t.  
“Ask him if he thinks we can make it to the North Pole.”  
Boone, at least semi-aware of how far away the North Pole actually was, didn’t bother asking.  
“Ask him how far we can get on a tankful, then,” the Courier said, narrowly missing a jet junkie who seemed oblivious to the noise of her engine.  
“Give range,” Boone relayed.  
“Oh, no need to worry about that, Boss. Cass’ moonshine is some efficient shit. We can go a good 300 clicks before we run dry,” Raul reported.  
The Courier said to Boone, “Ask Cass and Vero how it’s going in their car.”  
“DeLorean. Report.”  
Cass yelled, “It’s fuckin’ sweet! I love this! Hey I got the best idea ever! Let’s head to Cottonwood Cove and give those Legion dirtbags the fright of their fuckin’ lives! Let’s run over all their stupid little tents and drive big holes through their goddamn slave cages and stir shit up!”  
At this, Boone turned to the Courier, and if invisible eyes could plead, his eyes were pleading right then. _Can we? Pleeeease?_  
“Oh my god!” Cass bellowed over the intercom. “V’ronica just had an even better idea! Let’s paint rude slogans all over the cars for them to read while we mow down their shit!”

Boone smiled. He actually smiled.  
The Courier had never seen that before, and if she told the others they’d call her a liar.

They were out of Freeside, now, and on the open road. It was killer. The DeLorean cruised up alongside them and Veronica saluted through her window. Her hair was loose and blowing freely in the wind. She looked happy in a way the Courier hadn’t seen before.

This was turning out to be the greatest thing that had ever happened.

The roads were munted, but swerving round debris and giant potholes just made it even more fun. Cass turned it up a notch and the DeLorean burned off ahead in a cloud of dust. Raul came up alongside the Interceptor, waving. Even Arcade looked cheerful. Raul grabbed the mic again.  
“Boss.”  
“Go.”  
“There’s something else, Boss. These cars can drive through water. I made them so they can function as boats as well,” Raul’s voice crackled.  
“You are shitting me,” the Courier said softly.  
“OH MY GOD!” Cass shrieked. “The Fort! We’ll mow shit down at the Fort! We’ll mow fuckin’ Caesar himself, flat as a pancake! Fuck yeah!”

Then Boone laughed. He _laughed._ It was just a soft chuckle, really, but nonetheless, it was a sound unheard for close to two years.

The Courier glanced at him. “What d’you say. It’s forty-odd miles to the Fort, we’ve got a full tank of gas, half a packet of cigarettes, it’s dark in here and you’re wearing sunglasses.”

Boone, face already impassive again, spoke two words.  
“Hit it.”

***

They stopped at the Gun Runners on the way to load up on grenades, Molotov cocktails, 5mm rounds and other goodies to use on the Legion boys. Also paint.

As they vroomed side-by-side up the towards the shore of Lake Mead, no longer bothering with the broken road since the desert was flat enough anyway, the three vehicles kicked up huge clouds of dust in their wake. Crows and mutated animals scattered to make way for the convoy of doom.

“Eat Leadd, Liegion Cocksuckers!” it said on one side of Cass’ car, “Suck My Exaust Feums Limpdicks!” was emblazoned on the other.

Arcade had been more circumspect. The red pick-up declared, in neat lettering, “Caesar’s philosophy is not even internally consistent!” and “Mars is just a small planet!” (under which Veronica, as dictated to by Cass, had added “Uranus is much more spacious!”)  
Across the back it said “Slaves, jump on!”  
If any slaves dared, with Lily and Rex already back there.

The black Falcon was allowed to retain some dignity. Across the back was just the one ominous word, **INTERCEPTOR**.  
On the bonnet, Boone had revealed himself to have some serious art skills. He’d painted a very accurate rendition of the first recon emblem, a skull over two crossed rifles.

“Where’d you learn to paint like that?” asked the courier as they blew across the desert. The vehicles had fallen into formation now, with the Interceptor at the head of an inverted V.  
“All 1st Recon guys are good with their hands,” was Boone’s unusually verbose answer. He pulled out the car’s lighter and lit another cigarette, taking a drag and offering it to the Courier. She didn’t normally smoke. All of a sudden though, the idea of touching something with her lips that had just touched Boone’s was oddly appealing.

Which was a worry, because Rule No. 1 of the Lucky 38 gang was:  
1\. Don’t screw the crew.  
Even Cass abided by it. Sex with another member of the gang was cause for instant dismissal. The Courier had made the rule herself, because she didn’t want any drama.  
But still... leaning back in her sexy car, looking like he was made for it or vice versa, his jaw all chiselled and stubbly and his sensuous lips almost kissing his smoke, Mr Good-with-his-hands suddenly seemed damn near irresistible.

The Courier resisted. She had to. Otherwise, what kind of leader would she be? And the devil only knew, Boone was drama-prone. So she looked away, and focussed on driving.

The coast was not much further ahead. She hoped Cass didn’t get too blindly chuck-happy with the grenades once they reached the Fort. IF they reached the Fort. Boat-cars, indeed. Raul might just have lost the last of his marbles, there.

Turned out, he hadn’t. They gingerly drove the cars down to the water’s edge and stopped. Raul went first, driving out into the water, Arcade’s face in the window looking frankly terrified. The HiLux was good for it though. Raul motored happily away across the bay, and the DeLorean followed him.

The Courier took a deep breath. “Ready to sink or swim, Boone?”  
“Always,” he answered.  
The Courier made no move. Raul was getting further away.  
Boone put his hand over hers, took the handbrake off, and they rolled into the water.

***

Raul slowed for them to catch up, which was good because there was a welcoming committee forming on the far shore.

The Legate Lanius was there, standing at the front of a large group of legionaries and slaves, most of whom were gaping in open astonishment at the incoming convoy of godlike cars that could drive on water. Or even drive at all.

Lanius alone didn’t look impressed.  
“Eat Leadd? You can’t even SPELL lead!” he boomed as they approached up the hardpacked sand on the beach. The Legionaries all laughed. Until Cass, driving with her knees, pointed a grenade-launcher at them and they scrambled frantically in all directions. Rex leapt out of the back of the pickup and started biting people indiscriminately. Lily jammed her feet against the sides of the truckbed and began blazing with a minigun.  
“Eat up all of your lead or you can’t have desert!” roared Lily.

Arcade leaned out of his window. “Don’t shoot slaves Lily!” he yelled back, ineffectually. Lily was mowing down everyone in sight.

Raul sped up and followed the Interceptor up towards the gates, in front of which a few alarmed-looking guards hopped from foot to foot, clutching their weapons in front of them like talismans.

“Hold on, kiddo!” Raul told Arcade, and stepped on the gas to pass the Interceptor and ram the gates, which burst open and fell to pieces, no match for the bullbars on the souped-up HiLux.

The three cars careened through and up the hill, the guards taking hopeless potshots at them from behind.

The Interceptor moved in front as they neared the top of the hill, where Caesar and the bulk of the Legion men were. Boone was no longer leaning back in his seat looking all cool and relaxed. Now he was leaning out of his window with his rifle aimed dead ahead, looking all cool and relaxed. A cigarette still rested in the corner of his mouth. His red beret was tucked into his belt. No way was he risking that flying off. There are risks, and then there are crazy risks.

“Straight in?” yelled the Courier.  
Boone nodded once, not taking his eyes off what was in front of his barrel.

There were Praetorian guards all around, but Boone didn’t fire yet. They leap aside as the Interceptor ploughed straight into the front of Caesar’s command tent. Tables and men were knocked flying. Behind them, grenade explosions and the high-pitched whine of Lily’s minigun were rivalling the Interceptor for deafening noise.

Caesar was right in front of them; like everyone else, too stunned to react. Boone, cool as you like, squeezed the trigger.

Boom! Just like that, one dead Caesar. Thought he was a god, lived like a monster, died like a human.

Boom! Boom! Boom! Boone took out praetorian guards as the Interceptor reversed at high speed out of the tent. The Courier didn’t want to risk the car getting tangled up in canvas.

Outside, there was a problem. The DeLorean was stopped, and Cass and Veronica were in trouble. Legionaries were swarming them, and inside, Cass couldn’t get enough range to safely use an explosive.

The HiLux was out of sight, around the other side of the Fort, taking out more of Lanius’ men.

The Courier decided desperate measures were called for. She did to the men on one side of the DeLorean what the HiLux had done to the front gates. As bodies flew into the air, Veronica threw the gullwing door up and punched her way over to the Interceptor, Cass close behind, moving back to back with Veronica and swiping with her grenade-launcher at anyone who got within range.

It was going to be a problem squeezing in, because the Interceptor was a two-door car. Boone started to get out. He’d done what he wanted to do, and he didn’t mind swapping his life for Cass and Veronica’s. He didn’t need to, though, because just then the HiLux came flying around the corner and Lily reached down and hauled the two battling women up into the back of the pickup like they were dolls. Rex was already up there with her, slightly bloodied and barking happily.

Boone slipped back into his seat and the Interceptor tore off down the hill after the HiLux.

Behind them, the DeLorean stood shining in the sun on the top of the hill, a monument both to the Lucky 38 gang’s supreme audaciousness, and to its own bad engineering.

***

“In retrospect, I probably should have fixed up the Dodge Challenger instead of the DeLorean,” Raul said, later that night over a high-proof rum’n’Nuka in the Lucky 38’s cocktail lounge. “Or the Mini.”

“Nah, that car ruled. I’m gonna go back and get it,” Cass vowed.  
“How? It broke down, Cass. It’s not going anywhere,” Veronica reminded her.

If only Veronica was right about that. As it turned out, Lanius has not died, and worse, Vulpes Inculta was a dab hand at sciencey things. Working day and night, fired by hatred, he reverse-engineered the DeLorean and its surprisingly simple fuel, and within a week, hatched a plan for revenge.

***

“Lanius has done it again,” said Vulpes, indicating the twisted body of a recruit dumped outside the Legate’s tent. “He’s never going to learn.”  
“But we will teach him, Vulpes. You are going to take him with you,” replied Lucius, without breaking his stride.  
Vulpes stopped. “No way. Not me, not with him.”  
“Yes, him. He is the new Caesar, and we must encourage him to behave like it.” Lucius walked away.  
Vulpes ground his teeth. “You’re wasting your time!” he shouted at Lucius’ retreating back. “The skag don’t rate! He’s nothing like Caesar!”  
Lucius didn’t stop walking. Vulpes looked furiously at the Legate’s tent, willing him to come out so they could solve it between them once and for all. No one emerged. Vulpes spat on the ground, shot a death-look at some legionaries who were standing around watching, and stalked off to prepare for the mission.

***

If necessity is the mother of invention, revenge is the mother’s nasty boyfriend.

Veronica, Lily and Rex were in the habit of going for a walk at around dawn every morning. Rex to stretch his legs and have a pee, Lily because she liked to go out picking wildflowers before the heat of the day got too intense, and Veronica because she was insomniac and enjoyed the company.

At around 5 o’clock one morning, they were walking along the road southeast of the city when they heard a strange noise. In the distance they could see a tiny silver shape, creating a massive dust cloud behind it. It got louder. Too late, Veronica realised what it was.

Inside the DeLorean, Vulpes was driving fast, leaning forward with teeth gritted, knuckles white on the wheel, boot hard down on the accelerator.

Lanius was in the passenger seat, cradling a lapful of pulse grenades and dynamite. Between his feet was a 5-gallon drum of Vulpes’ counterfeited moonshine. Strapped to the dashboard was a fully loaded H&K G11E, the only one of its kind that the Legion possessed, a fabled and fantastically powerful assault rifle. So treasured it had never been brought into play before. But now, to avenge Caesar’s death, its time to speak had come.

Lily and Veronica were peaceful people at heart, but this was the Wasteland and no one was foolish enough to go out into it unarmed. Veronica’s powerfist wouldn’t help against a speeding car, but Lily had an assault carbine.  
“Run home, dear, quickly!” Lily cried, lifting the gun to take aim at the vehicle careening directly towards them.

Veronica ran towards cover, Rex bounding along at her side, barking merrily. The nearest cover, however, was far away. Lily held the gun steady, took aim, and fired. Her aim was true. The front window of the DeLorean shattered into a million fragments, but it didn’t stop coming. Vulpes, protected in his trademark doghead and black wraparound eyewear, spat out a square of safety glass and didn’t miss a beat.

He was mad but not mad enough to try to hit Lily, who weighed close to a ton. Instead he swerved wildly around the nightkin, skidding out the back wheels till the DeLorean was travelling almost sideways, then gaining traction again and firing off in the direction Veronica and Rex had run.

Lily aimed again, and hit, but the car was too far away now to sustain any serious damage.  
“No!” she howled, as she saw what was about to happen.

Ten minutes later in the Lucky 38, Yes Man’s annoying voice blared over the PA system. “ALERT! ASSAULT ON FREESIDE IN PROGRESS!”  
In the Presidential Suite, groggy brains came to, and eyes blearily opened.  
“ALERT! ASSAULT ON FREESIDE IN PROGRESS!”

“Do we care about that?” asked Cass thickly, still two-thirds asleep.  
“ALERT! ASSAILANTS APPROACHING THE STRIP!”  
“Now we do,” answered Raul.

The Courier came in, with a severe case of bed-hair. “Anyone know what’s going on?”  
Arcade came in behind her, still in his shorts. “Who’s attacking the city?”  
“Men!” yelled Yes Man excitedly. He wasn’t programmed to have a sense of worry to accompany his sense of danger.

Boone strode in, fully combat-dressed and armed, dark glasses in place. “S’go,” he said to the assembled pajama-party, and turned on his heel.  
“You heard the man, look alive,” the Courier ordered, with as much authority as someone with bed-hair can muster.

Outside, the DeLorean was wreaking havoc. Lanius’ pulse grenades had decommissioned the securitrons, and the Strip was a strip of blue fire, made of burning moonshine. The Delorean raced from one end of the Strip to the other, oblivious to the fire, Lanius hurling lit sticks of dynamite at buildings.

The DeLorean worked for the other side now. Cass’ anti-Legion slogans had been scrubbed off. There was a bull painted on the bonnet, and on Vulpes’ side in angry red letters it read: “You think you’re big time?? You’re gonna FUCKING DIE, big time”. On Lanius’ side the wording was larger and more succinct: “HERE COMES THE PAIN”.

The Courier and her crew were too stunned to react as the traitorous vehicle came towards them, then slowed down suspiciously. By rights it should have broken down by now. 

Lanius popped open the gull wing door, armed with the H&K G11E.  
“DOWN!” screamed Boone, shoving the Courier flat on her face as a deafening barrage of 4.7mm caseless strafed the casino doors just above their heads.

Boone was trying to line up a shot but there wasn’t any time. The DeLorean’s engine roared as Vulpes sped up, and the two-man shock-assault team blitzed through the gates and away, leaving the citizenry of Vegas and Freeside singed and terrified, their buildings cracked and smoking.

The Courier climbed up onto the burnt-out bus next to the Lucky 38 and watched the DeLorean’s dust wake disappear towards the horizon.  
“Of course you know, this means war,” she said softly to herself.

Then Lily hove into view, tears streaming from her eyes, carrying a badly injured Veronica and a dead Rex, and everything changed. It was no longer a fun play-war. Not that it ever had been, from the Legion’s point of view.

Arcade took Veronica to the Follower’s, and she was sedated while they reset her broken legs. When they had done everything they could for her, the Lucky 38 crew held a solemn funeral for Rex.

Then they had a emergency war cabinet meeting.  
“I think it’s fair to say that shit just got serious,” the Courier declared. “Veronica is badly hurt, Rex was squashed, our city is on fire, and most unforgivable of all, they made Lily cry.” She shook her head. “Nope. Unacceptable. So. What are we going to do about it?”  
“We fight fire with fire,” Boone said. Everyone looked at him. His jaw jutted. “We drive back to their holdout, and this time we finish the job.”  
The Courier nodded. “All in favour?”  
“Fuckin’ A, I’m in favour. Let’s smash ‘em to pieces,” snarled Cass.  
“I think I’d be better to stay here and look after Veronica,” Arcade said.  
“You gutless d-” started Cass. The Courier shushed her with a gesture.  
“No, Arcade’s right, Veronica needs him. Ok. Raul, get the Interceptor and the Hi-Lux ready. Let’s not give ‘em any more time to get ready. We ride tonight.”


	2. Rrraul the V8th vs the Dread Pirate Dead Sea

All was still when the Lucky 38 Gang arrived at Lake Mead. Tiny waves rippled gently against the shore. Night had fallen, and stars twinkled above.

“It’s quiet. Too quiet,” said Boone, squinting into the darkness and sniffing the air.  
The Courier nodded. “You’re right. They’ll hear our engines as we cross the lake.”  
Cass snorted. “They’ve probably already heard us. Let’s just go over there and smash stuff up, whether they expect us or not.”  
“I’d say they are expecting us, all their fires are out. Pity for them they didn’t know cars have headlights! Ha ha! I hope they’re expecting us - all the more reason for them to roll over and die of shame when we beat the shit out of them,” added Raul.

“They may have mined the landing point.” Boone stared intently across the lake, towards the dark silhouette of the hilltop fort.  
That was a disconcerting thought.  
“Suggestions?” asked the Courier.  
Boone answered slowly, “I drive the interceptor over and land first. You guys all ride in the Hi-Lux behind me. Follow my wheel tracks. When I explode, reverse the fuck outta there.”  
“...‘When’?!”  
“I meant if,” said Boone with no discernible change in tone.  
The Courier’s brow knitted. “I don’t like it.” The mental image of Boone exploding alone on the beach, without even the honour of taking any Legionaries with him, did not sit well.  
Raul was shaking his head. “You won’t be able to shoot anyone if you’re driving,” he pointed out.  
Boone’s jaw hardened. “Courier’ll be able to shoot just as well from your car as mine.”

Boone could not be moved, so the matter was settled. The courier rode with Lily in the back of the Hi-Lux. The vehicles transformed into their boat incarnations, and slipped quietly into the water.

It was eerie, travelling on water in pitch darkness. The Courier forced herself not to think of Mirelurk Kings swimming below.  
“I wish Rex was here,” said Lily.  
“Me too,” agreed the Courier wholeheartedly.  
“Where is he?” asked Lily. She’d forgotten carrying him back, all broken, to the 38 after Vulpes and Lanius had smashed into him in the commandeered DeLorean. It had been a terrible thing to see Lily cry so inconsolably, and the Courier couldn’t bear to remind her of it.  
“He moved back in with the King,” she lied. “He was getting a bit old for so much action, needed a rest.”  
“Ah,” said Lily, but she said it softly, and the Courier knew Lily had a sense of something more to the story, something sad. The old lady didn’t get a chance to ask, though, because her face was illuminated in that moment by an incredibly bright light shooting up into the air from around 100 yards away. On the lake.

It was a flare, and it had come from another boat. They caught a glimpse of it as the rocket flew up into the sky. A mid-size motorboat, refurbished from the abandoned seaside campground on the shore and powered by Vulpes’ counterfeit moonshine. The flare hung in the sky above the Hi-Lux, casting an ill light over them and pinpointing their position.

“Step on it, Raul!” the Courier yelled, expecting to get peppered by bullets any second.  
Raul was already pedal to the metal but the Hi-Lux wasn’t fast in water. They were barely doing five knots.

With some difficulty, Boone manoeuvred the Interceptor so his headlights shone on the motorboat, putting himself in equal danger, but at least allowing them to return fire.

Staring at the strange and menacing lines of the enemy ship, the Courier’s stomach went cold. Loaded onto the deck was the Howitzer from the top of the Fort. The one she herself had obtained a spare part from the Boomers for. That had been a stupid move, alright. The cannon’s gigantic barrel was already swiveling to line the Hi-Lux up in its sights.

Through a loudspeaker, the dread pirate Dead Sea, merciless cut-throat and captain of the MV Blastya, hailed them.

“Check-mate, me maties!” he bellowed. A tricorne hat sat atop his tangled blonde hair. He stabbed his finger at them, and the cannon exploded into life, blasting an 8-inch sphere of lead at the Hi-Lux. It whistled above the Courier’s head and landed in the water behind them, creating a terrific splash, the resulting waves rocking their smaller vessels dangerously close to the gunwales.

“Yarrrrhh!” yelled multiple voices in unison as they lowered the trajectory slightly to line up another shot.  
“Evasive manoeuvres!” shrieked the Courier to Raul in the cockpit. He was already doing his best, but the Hi-Lux had the turning circle of a whale. 

Another flare zoomed up, its blue-white glare revealing that the lights and noise had attracted a school of lakelurks, now circling them just under the water, like slimy, tentacled vultures. The Courier tried to suppress rising panic. She hurled a grenade at the MV Blastya but it was beyond her throwing arm range, and detonated a few feet underwater, creating more dangerous waves.

Boone’s hi-beams flashed off and on, and the sound of his rifle could intermittently be heard, trying to distract Dead Seadog onto him, but the whippersnapper wasn’t taking the bait.

Another cannonball whistled towards them, and took the roof of the cockpit with it, leaving Cass and Raul’s heads exposed. “PLAY NICELY!” shouted Lily to the cheering pirates.  
“What are the rules of this game?” Lily then enquired of the Courier. Oh no, she was even further gone than usual.  
The Courier was about to beg Lily to pick up her neglected minigun when Raul pre-empted her. “Lily! The rules are, catch the ball and throw it back!”

Dead Sea hailed them again. “This is jolly, isn’t it, scurvy dogs? Ready to pay a visit to Davy Jones’ locker?”  
“I’ll take you with me!” bawled back the Courier with a lot more bravado in her voice than she felt.

BOOM! The cannon flashed again. As if in slow motion, the Courier watched a cannonball come directly at her head. The she saw a huge hand appear in front of her face, smoothly catching the projectile.

“Here you go, dearies!” Lily called politely, before belting the ball back at them with at least as much force as the howitzer. Her arm was a much more accurate instrument though, and the ball found its target, smashing through the upper hull of the MV Blastya. The ancient fibreglass hull cracked like an eggshell, and water began seeping, then gushing through the growing cracks.

“All hands on deck! Stand yer ground! Fire again!” screamed the dread captain to his deckhands, to deaf ears. They were frantically bailing water out, full buckets coming up from below, hurriedly emptied over the side and tossed back down. 

_Crack!_ Boone got a bullet right through Dead Sea’s eye. He staggered, but incredibly, stayed standing. There was no time to affix a piratey eye-patch though, the overweighted Blastya was sinking. It rolled upside down, then up-ended, the stern disappearing and the bow slipping fast down into the black waters of the lake.

There was a horrible thrashing on the surface where it had been. Legionary sailors were trying to swim back to shore but instead were being feasted on by lakelurks. The Courier watched as one Legionary got lifted right into the air, by a thick tentacle where no tentacle should have gone, and then smacked down onto the surface, leaving him stunned and all the easier to consume.

The scene was gruesome and not a little terrifying. The Courier’s stomach went from cold to nauseated, but she steeled herself. “That’s for Rex,” she whispered to herself.

Lily was appalled too. “Oh dear!” she fretted, covering her mouth.  
“It’s alright, Miss Lily,” Raul said over his shoulder, steering back to the mainland and safety. “You did good. Real good.”

The 38 gang went home, glad it was over.

But it wasn’t over. Vulpes had unfortunately discovered a passion and a talent for engineering. And even more unfortunately, he knew where there was a cache of 1977 Kawasaki KZ1000 motorbikes.


	3. No Guts, No Glory

There’s something about a fat back tire. Something primal. It just looks _right_. When you see a plump, beautifully grooved back tire, you instinctively want to put your weight on it. You want to climb on and give it a good spin. Take it out on the road, put it through its paces, feel its vibrations in your core.

Add to that the sensation of wind fluttering your shirt, the landscape rushing past, nothing fast enough to catch you or even stay with you. Like earth hurtling through space, you are alone, flying along, momentum and gravity in harmony.

***

After the ugly encounter on Lake Mead, the courier and her gang left the Legion alone. She got on with life in Vegas, as imperatrix. She seemed to no longer want to play their game of tit-for-tat.

But the game, which had started out as a lark, had grown deadly serious. They’d killed her dog, broken the legs of her close friend, and peppered the Strip with bullet holes. Trivialities. She, by contrast, had killed Caesar himself, along with scores of legionaries, veterans as well as recruits.

No, with the score so badly misbalanced, they couldn’t just forgive and forget. She must pay.

***

On his knees, wearing an old RobCo overall, Vulpes ran his hand over the back tire of his reconditioned Kawasaki Z1000. He brushed some grains of sand off it, his touch more than just proprietary, something closer to reverence. No human being, other than Caesar himself of course, had been found worthy of his adoration as this motorcycle had. It was a piece of engineering so fine, every time Vulpes discovered another small aspect of its workings, he fell in love with it again. With the exception of the paintwork, nothing was superfluous on it, everything had a precise purpose, designed to be as efficient, hardy, and aerodynamic as mechanically possible. He often wondered who had designed it. He’d liked to have saluted that man. 

Lanius, the new Caesar, sneered when he first saw Vulpes wearing the RobCo suit. He said it alluded to false gods. Likewise, he was not especially impressed by Vulpes’ new interest in engineering. However, he had liked the smaller man’s role as chief spy even less, so when Vulpes formally requested to retire from the Frumentarii and spearhead a new engineering division instead, Lanius grudgingly agreed. He could not get rid of Vulpes altogether. The little creep was just too useful for that. Plus, he didn’t seem to have enacted any ambition to take on the role of Caesar, and no one liked or trusted him much anyway, so Lanius viewed him as a tolerable threat to his position. 

The praetorian Lucius, enduringly popular with the men, might have been a bigger threat; but Lucius was greatly enamoured of Vulpes’ new engineering plans, and equally disinterested in rule. The two men spent their days in a makeshift workshop, mostly in silence, Vulpes sketching mechanisms on paper, Lucius devising ways to craft the designs into physical existence. They regularly sent out scouts whose mission was to locate and acquire tools and parts of any and every kind. Those who brought back useful items were well rewarded.

They had two KZ1000s in good condition, seventeen more in conditions ranging from so-so to bad. There had been a twentieth, but Vulpes had dissected it for parts. He was seriously considering doing the same to another. Some parts were so difficult to replicate – hence the open-ended order for more and better tools.

He and Lucius sometimes treated themselves to rides on the two best bikes. Each machine had space for a rider and a pillion passenger. The rider could not do much more than ride, which was a challenge enough in the variable terrain, but the passenger would be able to use binoculars, fire weapons, throw incendiaries, whatever else the moment required. This must have been the original purpose of the second seat, Vulpes surmised.

Riding felt so free, so powerful. He loved the feel of the engine roaring beneath him. He loved the control he had over the mighty machine. To curve his path he merely had to look in that direction. 

They dispatched some men to clear and mend a piece of road not far from the Fort, and once it good enough condition, they did time trials, finding to their delight that the bikes could hit 130mph. They practised tight turns, emergency stops, side-on skids, stoppies.

One day Vulpes saw bright gold sparks flying out from under Lucius’ metal-armoured knee as the older man leant around a corner at breakneck speed, fat back tire at one with the tarmac. He was electrified, and all the littlest hairs on his body stood on end.

They worked tirelessly on getting the other bikes into order. On the rare occasions when they conversed about anything other than the bikes, it was to discuss who they would train to take with them. Who was worthy of handling these glorious pieces of machinery. Who had the skills, the instincts, and most of all, the guts.

“No guts, no glory,” Lucius quoted, punching his fist into the hard muscle of his own stomach. He wiped sweat from his forehead and left a wide black smear of engine grease.  
Vulpes, still stroking his back tire, looked up. It was perfect. He took a fingerful of engine grease and painted his own forehead black.

After that, they had a coda. Vulpes already wore his hair buzzcut, now Lucius cut his the same way. The heat in the workshop was intense, and they worked shirtless, with their RobCo overalls tied off around their waists. When they found beautiful engine parts, they heated them and stamped them into their flesh, branding themselves with the objects of their obsession. And every day they painted their foreheads with grease, making them look insane to onlookers. But they knew what it meant. No guts, no glory. Death was coming to the Courier, a lovely death of screaming metal, of chrome and rubber and poisonous fumes.


	4. Bigger enemies

“Boss.”  
“Raul?”  
“I got something to show you.”

It was 5 am, but that didn’t matter. When Raul says he’s got something to show you, it’ll be worth seeing. The Courier, still half asleep, climbed out of bed and dragged on the scruffy remains of what used to be a recon suit.

Raul was silent, apart from creaking, as they travelled down in the elevator. The Courier leant back against the corner and almost fell asleep again. 

Raul triggered the front doors of the Lucky 38 and gestured the Courier through. The Toyota Hi-Lux was angle-parked right up on the steps, just as it had been when he first showed it to her. But it wasn’t a Toyota Hi-Lux anymore.

“I call it the War Rig,” Raul said, pride warming his old voice. The Hi-Lux, once a humble 2-ton, 4-wheeled vehicle, now ran to 27 tons, 18 wheels. Raul had added a tanker frame, and on top of that sprouted the cabs of other vehicles like treehouses. In the front, the imposing cast-iron pilot of an ancient steam train was attached to a mechanism the purpose of which the Courier could only guess at.

“You can get between all the hidey holes, there are gangways inside,” Raul said, pointing at various parts of the structure. “C’mon up.” He helped the Courier to climb up the outside of the vehicle, and they walked along the top of it. At the back was a dome-shaped steel turret, large enough even for Lily to crouch inside, with a long, howitzer-like barrel pointing out of it. “That’s a Russian T-54, got it from a museum,” Raul said, nodding. “D-10T cannon, 100mm. You could punch a hole right through the Lucky 38 with this beauty.”

The Courier finally spoke. “Raul.”  
“Si?”  
“We’re gonna have to find some bigger enemies.”

Once Boone, Arcade, Cass and Lily to woke up and get their boots on, the Courier and Raul decided to test the War Rig out by paying a visit to Duke, over in the South Vegas Ruins. Duke was one of the nastiest personalities the Courier had yet encountered, and she’d regretted not blowing him away back when she’d had the opportunity. Now, she didn’t need an opportunity. She had a War Rig.

***

Over at the Legion camp Lucius and Vulpes were holding auditions, of a sort, for riders. Picking out the most fearless veterans as riders, and the smallest, lightest recruits as pillion rear-gunners. There was no shortage of willing contenders, but they wanted the right men. Each man who passed the test received a RobCo jumpsuit, had their hair shorn and their foreheads ceremonially annointed with engine grease.

Those chosen to ride pillion were just boys, most of them. Too young for hand-to-hand combat, but ideal for perching lightly on the back of a Kawasaki and flexing their trigger fingers. Lucius dubbed them the War Boys.

***

They say great minds think alike. There was something similar in the engineering approach of Lucius to that of Raul. In lieu of immaculate condition machinery, and with badly-needed spare parts simply unavailable, they improvised. The best two Kwaka’s were not much changed, but the other 17 were heavily modified from their handlebars to their tail lights. Some had an extra wheel added at the back to make them ‘trikes’, more stable in straight lines, sacrificing tight cornering. The trikes were loaded with heavy artillery, and twisted spikes to slash anyone or anything that got too close. Other bikes had everything extraneous stripped off and used nitrous oxide injection systems, making them very light and super fast.

Once a team was chosen, they dedicated a few days to practising manoeuvres and formations. The attack was scheduled to occur on the next Sunday morning, when it was known that the Courier liked to go out for a long walk outside the city, stretch her legs and take some air, sometimes with one or more of her companions, sometimes alone. They planned to cut her off, vehicularly terrorize her till it got boring, if it ever did, then take her back to the fort with them as a trophy-cum-slave.

On Saturday night, Vulpes lay under the stars, thinking of nothing, letting the sensation of anticipation be its own pleasure.

***

On Sunday morning, the Courier got up early and headed out of the city as usual. Boone came with her. 

Since the Interceptor had roared into their lives a few months ago, they were closer. Didn’t speak any more than usual, but just felt closer. Boone tagged along on errands without being asked. Cleaned her guns every day after he’s done his own. In the evenings, when the gang was all sitting around in the Lucky 38 cocktail floor having a drink, Boone would be next to her on the sofa. Never a word; just closer.

As for the Courier, this was just fine with her, except for one thing. The closer Boone got, the harder the gang’s number 1 rule, _Don’t Screw the Crew_ , was to abide by. 

Raul and the rest of the gang were back at the ’38, sleeping off a heavy night on the Gamma Gulp. The attack on Duke had been a wild success, literally a blast. The war rig had been epic. Jaws hit the floor wherever it went. Crowds had run behind them, following them to Duke’s compound, to see what would happen, and they hadn’t been disappointed. Duke existed now only as a long, thin smear on the ground and a bad memory in his victims’ minds. The celebrations had gone on long into the night. 

The Courier and Boone walked, not holding hands, not quite touching, but close. She looked at him and smiled. He looked at her and held her gaze till she looked away. He kept looking for an extra second, then looked away into the distance, taking a long drag on his commie. On the horizon was a faint disturbance in the dust. Boone focussed on it but couldn’t make anything out. A herd of bighorners perhaps, kicking up the dust with thundering hooves.


End file.
